TIGER WOODS: The Transcript Tells the Story

I’ve been waiting to comment on Tiger’s issues at a press conference at the JP McManus charity pro-am in Ireland yesterday because I was interested in seeing the full transcript.

When you look at it, it seems like every other Tiger press conference lately. Very expansive on the golf questions, with few words on the personal questions. I think the reason why Tiger got so ticked off at the first personal question is the following:

Q. Can you tell us where you feel your game is right now and how important it is for you to do well, if not win, next week, given it’s on one of your favourite courses?
TIGER WOODS: Well, I felt I made some pretty good strides last week. I hit the ball — I drove it great last week, and just putted terrible. Consequently, I finished way down the board and that’s something I’m going to work on and really work on my lag putting and make sure that’s organised, a lot of big, long, lag putts at St. Andrews.
I’m really looking forward to getting there and competing.

Q. What will your build-up be to St. Andrews?
TIGER WOODS: Practising.

Q. Where?
TIGER WOODS: Home.

Q. Why not try and play some links golf beforehand?
TIGER WOODS: I need to get home.

Q. Personal stuff?
TIGER WOODS: See my kids.

Q. If you’re unlucky enough not to win the British Open, who at the moment has the game and the form to win?
TIGER WOODS: A lot of guys are, some of the young players, and even some of the guys this year that have good years that now they are 40, being Ernie and Phil. But it’s an Open. That’s the beauty of it; there’s more players in this field than any other. It will be a good test.

I believe that due to the fact that he hinted at what he needed to do to get ready for St. Andrews — practice his lag putting — he deemed the next question as obvious and gave a shortened answer. Then, as the questions turned more personal, he gave shorter and shorter answers, until he got to the next golf question.

Now I can’t comment on why Tiger went the way he did with the next set of personal questions, but here’s the direct before and after context:

Q. You’ve been talking about how well you’ve been received by a lot of people here the last two days; a little girl breaking through security to get your autograph yesterday and people standing on the range watching; with the recent behaviour and the problems you’ve had, at a time like this, where you risk losing family or you risk losing the sponsorship that accompanies it, do you ever reflect, was it worth it?
TIGER WOODS: I think you’re looking too deep into this.

Q. It’s not something that you would —
TIGER WOODS: Thank you.

Q. I understand you’re flying back this afternoon; this must be one of your shortest trips to Europe on record. Is there any other event that you would take such a time-out from your schedule to come and honour?
TIGER WOODS: Well, I think any time you support friends, and JP has meant a lot to my life; and I truly believe in what he’s doing to help others, and that’s why I’m here.

Q. Five years ago, we spoke about your foundation, and encouraging kids to play golf, and at the time you said you possibly might bring it to Europe. Any plans or on track?
TIGER WOODS: I think that’s one of the reasons why we opened up the campuses in D.C. we have two new campuses — what we call campuses. I think that might be our model going forward in how we can expand globally. We are going to let that play out a little bit and see how that goes. But I think that could be our blueprint to expanding globally.

As you can see as soon as he gets back to golf and charity related questions, he becomes expansive again.

So look, while you can question his word choice with the 2nd personal question, the first set clearly, in my opinion, came out of frustration over a dumb question. Tiger needs to get used to this for next week at the Open Championship, however, because as so many know, the British press can be unrelenting, however in appropriate it may be.

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At least the British press has the gonads to ask the questions that the jellyfish in the American golf press won’t, out of fear that they’ll lose access to Tiger.

As for being “inappropriate”, what is appropriate? Blatantly ignoring the facts about this man? Refusing to question the tailspin his life has gone into? Because the golf media has tens of thousands of questions at their disposal, but they refuse to ask them because they quake in fear over getting shut out by Tiger and his cronies.

The questions about Tiger’s personal life are legitimate questions. When the greatest golfer in the world goes on a sudden and rapid decline into complete mediocrity, with nothing really justifying it, then you have to wonder whether or not it’s because of his off-the-course activities.

Maybe his mind is focused on the $750 million that Elin is about to pocket. Maybe he’s thinking too much about that Chili’s waitress in Clearwater. But whatever it is, it’s throwing his game off.

Like I said the other day, Tiger Woods has gone on the most sudden and precipitous fall into mediocrity in recent memory. And whether or not he wants to talk about it, you’ve got to wonder whether or not his antics off the course have anything to do with it.